It is all obvious or trivial except…

The US Government closed down 5 hours ago. Are they all dead yet?

The roads disappeared, hospitals not treating the ill, the food supplies gone, the entire continent a howling wasteland filled with the desperate calling for their beneficient protectors to return to power?

It’s not the government that’s shut down. The politicians are still in work. It’s the workers who are not. Not the critical staff, but those working in the far outer reaches such as park rangers, stats will not be prepared, etc.

The rather obvious point, William, is that the Democrats (and their fellow travellers in the BBC over on this side of the Atlantic) are playing it as though temporarily laying off some government workers will mean the end of civilisation; whereas, in reality*, it won’t.

Initially we didn’t think much would happen, that the national parks shutting down would be shock enough. That the Top Men in Washington would restore order quickly. Now the roads are gone.

Wild rape-gangs are roaming the streets, and a new cult has sprung up. Eugenicists, they patrol the wasteland looking for the poor and undocumented Mexicans. The extermination camps run day and night – the evening winds blow the choking ash down on us. We’ve barricaded our neighborhood but food is basically gone and the water won’t last much longer.

Planes are falling out of the sky. Wildfires are burning out of control. All the local businesses started dumping what looks like radioactive sludge into the nearest daycares. And the oceans started rising again.

Don’t mind me, just arranging some friends to do a drop off of some bath salts at a deserted beach somewhere in the US. Strange how many things are seen as illegal.
Must arrange a drop off of some kinder eggs next.

as far as I know, the major “victims” will be agencies such as the Armed Forces and the FBI and Homeland Security. It feels like aq bad move for Republicans to get to a situation where the military does not get paid. It is a very high risk strategy that has counted against them in the past – such as when Gingrich tried it on Clinton – but of course they didn’t have so many troops committed overseas then. And, given the number of internal US flights, where you have to go through Homeland Security checks, it has the potential to cause massive lack of gruntlement. High risk for very little political gain.

I was under the impression, from what I’ve read elsewhere, that such agencies as the armed forces and security services don’t fall under the ‘non-essential services’ rubric, and so funding for them will continue as before. That may be wrong, however.

PST/Diogenes: airport “security” is sadly unaffected AFAIK, the TSA continue to grope junk and confiscate breast milk in the name of continued peace of mind.

Tragically, the Department of Education, the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency are all currently shut down and, as Agammamon suggests above, we are coming to the end of the world. The still-open (state-operated) schools have a break from federal paperwork, Amish farmers can sell unpasteurised milk, and people living near wetlands have a day free of threats to repossess their lands and fine them into oblivion.

Meanwhile Washington DC has ground to a halt, but it seems that no-one actually cares other than its inhabitants.

I am still waiting to hear how my US friends (mostly high school teachers) are impacted by the shutdown…perhaps Connelley is waiting for evidence. But the thought of Connolley needing evidence for him to opine is just too stupid to imagine.

It’s about a debt ceiling, so the gummint has to cash flow its spending in line with its taxes.
800,000 workers have been sent home with no discernible effect on schools, transport, health care, industry…
See coyoteblog for some amusing stuff, national parks are going to catch fire, etc.

The military will continue to work and get paid – however the base commissaries will close next week once they’ve sold off their fresh produce. This really only affects *some* of the military living outside the US in high cost of living areas – the ones inside the US typically shop at a local supermarket anyway.

The DOJ is mostly fully functional – some *civil* cases are being put on hold but those take years anyway, a couple of weeks delay doesn’t mean much.

However – it turns out the US Forest Service is trying to coerce its contractor run parks to close along with the government run park – all to make the shutdown as inconvenient as possible.

Some of us military retirees might see our checks delayed, but eventually we will be paid and I can wait a long time to get paid if that’s what it takes – I don’t think many of us are truly short of money.